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Australia’s spinners might have combined for 17 wickets in the shock Test win over India, but it is pacemen Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood who will be the key on upcoming flat pitches.
The ability of Australia’s gun quicks to make breakthroughs with the new ball and then reverse swing the older version will be central across the final three Tests, which are expected to feature much more batting-friendly strips.
Indian media have reported that, after being obliterated on a raging turner in the first Test at Pune, the home team are likely to request docile decks for the remaining three Tests. This makes sense, given how India dominated England 4-0 on tame home pitches during their recent five-Test series.
Starc and Hazlewood are among only a handful of Test quicks who have the skills to remain effective on such lifeless surfaces, along with the likes of England’s Stuart Broad and South African Dale Steyn.
That Aussie pair have had to learn how to master batting paradises, which have been common during Australia’s past three home summers. Devoid of the pace and bounce typically associated with Australian pitches, many of the recent Test strips down under have been sleepy, requiring pacemen to produce movement through the air or off the seam to be successful.
Starc and Hazlewood are not just lions with the new ball but also masters of getting it to hoop around when it becomes weathered.
At Pune, spinners Steve O’Keefe and Nathan Lyon were Australia’s strike weapons on a parched surface which offered wild spin and bounce from the first hour of the Test. But if the remaining pitches are as unresponsive as those England received in their recent five-Test series in India then O’Keefe and Lyon will be used more as stock bowlers. Their task would be to bowl long spells and build pressure, in between short, sharp bursts of swing bowling from Starc and Hazlewood.
That’s not to suggest that Lyon and O’Keefe will be sidelined, as both of them will remain crucial to Australia’s hopes of securing an unexpected series win. Rather, it’s a recognition that Australia’s strength still lies with their pacemen, even after O’Keefe’s heroics at Pune.
O’Keefe and Lyon will find things far more difficult if the upcoming pitches are as dull as expected. While India’s batsmen floundered in the face of extreme turn and bounce in the first Test, they have a track record of dominating visiting spinners on batting-friendly strips.
It is impossible to predict exactly how the Bangalore pitch will play, but vision of it so far shows it is not anywhere near as dry as the deck at Pune. The general consensus among the cricketing media is that it looks as though it will be a great track for batting.
It seems India are banking on their ability to defeat Australia in a batting shootout, just as they did repeatedly to England, who made three good first innings totals yet still were flogged across the series.
On a batting-friendly deck, India’s batsmen would fear Starc and Hazlewood more than O’Keefe and Lyon, regardless of what happened at Pune.
The Australian quicks will be fresh as the morning breeze after barely being needed in the first Test, combining for only 20 overs and figures of 3-56. In that limited number of overs, both Starc and Hazlewood found some thoroughly testing reverse swing. The abrasive nature of both the pitch and the outfield allowed Hazlewood to reverse the ball in just the seventh over of the first innings.
It will take longer than that on a far lusher Bangalore ground. Nonetheless, it is Australia’s quicks who will pose the bigger threat to India at Bangalore, and perhaps across the remainder of this series.